As collaborative divorce lawyers, we meet many clients who want an amicable divorce, and who have chosen the collaborative divorce process to achieve that goal. With collaborative divorce, both spouses agree to settle their divorce outside court through collaborative negotiation. But, because both spouses agree to approach their divorce collaboratively, there must be “buy in” from both spouses.
If you want an amicable divorce and think that the collaborative divorce process might be right for you, this article will help you navigate the challenges of talking to your spouse about having a collaborative divorce. This article will give you the tools and information you need to prepare you for this difficult and crucial conversation.
Here’s an outline of what we’ll explore in this article:
- Set and Declare Your Intentions
- Before You Talk, Prepare
- A Divorce Plan
- Choose the Right Place and Time
- Choose Your Words Carefully
Set and Declare Your Intentions
Before you sit down to have the conversation, think deeply about your intentions. Many people want a collaborative divorce because they want to settle their divorce peacefully, want to establish a strong and amicable co-parenting relationship, or want more control over privacy and outcomes in their divorce (they don’t want to leave these decisions to a judge). When having the conversation about having a collaborative divorce, keep your intentions in mind, and make sure to express them to your partner.
According to the book, Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most, written by Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, and Sheila Heen, “…intentions are invisible. We assume them from other people’s behavior. In other words, we make them up, we invent them.” Joan Didion once wrote, “We tell ourselves stories in order to live.”
Your divorce process is no different. We tell ourselves stories about our partner’s intentions. We tell ourselves stories to survive our divorce, to save face, to navigate the difficult emotions.
When asking your spouse for a collaborative divorce, it’s understandable that your partner might question your intentions. This is why it’s important that you set and declare your intentions at the start of the conversation.
Most couples choose the collaborative divorce process because they want an amicable divorce. They don’t want to fight over details in court. They don’t want to hire adversarial lawyers who might drag things out without good reason. They want to work together, but they also want to protect their rights. They want to create a good co-parenting relationship with their former partner for the sake of their children. They want to divide assets and debts in a way that is fair—for both parties involved. They want to be friends after—or at least be able to run into one another in the grocery store without lingering resentment and anger. They don’t want to bring that bad energy to their lives or parenting going forward.
The marriage didn’t work out, but you still care about one another.
All these are great reasons to choose collaborative divorce.
Before You Talk, Prepare
If you’re thinking of asking your spouse for a collaborative divorce, it’s best to be prepared before you sit down to have the conversation.
Go into the conversation with knowledge about how the collaborative divorce process works, so that you can readily answer any questions your spouse might have.
Here are some key points about collaborative divorce that you might want to share:
- Collaborative divorce allows you and your spouse to settle your divorce outside court. Your collaborative divorce lawyers will work together to help you, and your spouse, reach a divorce settlement that works for you.
- With collaborative divorce, you and your spouse will sign an agreement to settle your divorce outside of court.
- With collaborative divorce, each partner is represented by their own collaborative divorce attorney. Your collaborative attorney’s job is to represent your legal interests and provide you with legal advice during the divorce settlement process. This makes collaborative divorce distinct from mediation, where the mediator cannot provide legal advice and cannot represent either party’s legal interests. With collaborative divorce, each spouse has their own attorney.
- With collaborative divorce, the divorce settlement process involves negotiations that take place in private.
- Both collaborative divorce attorneys are skilled at negotiation. A good collaborative divorce attorney will not only take the time to understand what you want out of your divorce and child custody settlement but will also take the time to work with you to understand the core motivations and driving factors that underlie your goals. With this information, collaborative divorce attorneys can help their clients navigate the give and take that goes into any divorce agreement.
- You can bring in additional experts, if needed, to help you settle your divorce. Some clients work with financial advisors, counselors, therapists, estate planners, and more.
It can also be helpful to share the benefits of collaborative divorce.
- The collaborative divorce process allows you and your spouse to control the outcome of your divorce. Rather than leaving crucial decisions about your life for a judge to decide, you and your partner can decide child custody for yourselves—and make decisions about how to divide assets, debts, the family home, retirement accounts, and more, without putting these important decisions in the hands of a stranger.
- When you take your divorce to court, your divorce becomes a public matter. Anything you argue about in court can end up on the public record. Couples choose collaborative divorce because they want privacy. With collaborative divorce, negotiations happen behind closed doors. If discussions get heated, everyone can take a time out, unlike in court, where the judge makes all decisions about the cadence of your case.
- With collaborative divorce, divorce negotiations happen on your timeline and aren’t dependent on court schedules—or when a judge has time to hear your case. In some instances, this can result in a faster divorce.
- With collaborative divorce, you get the benefit of being represented by your own collaborative divorce attorney who has your best interests in mind, but who also has made a commitment to work with your spouse’s collaborative divorce attorney to help you both avoid having to fight your divorce in court. Collaborative divorce lawyers are equipped to help their clients find creative solutions to disagreements that may arise. This is distinct from the adversarial approach that happens in many divorce cases, where each spouse hires his or her own attorney, whose goal is to help the client get the outcome they most want, leading to the possibility of months or even years of litigation.
- With collaborative divorce you can negotiate creative solutions. A judge may be constrained by the law regarding what he or she can do. But at the negotiating table, you and your spouse may have greater flexibility and more options.
With collaborative divorce, you and your former partner can set a strong foundation for your co-parenting relationship. Amicable divorces can lead to better co-parenting outcomes.
Many people often ask how the collaborative divorce process differs from mediation. It’s important to be prepared to explain how collaborative divorce and mediation are similar and different. Mediation is often a process that is initiated after a couple has already taken their divorce to court, and after each spouse has already hired a lawyer to represent them. In many cases, mediation is court-ordered because a couple cannot agree about child custody.
Some couples who want to pursue a collaborative divorce might initially mistake the collaborative process with mediation. But for many couples, mediation alone isn’t the appropriate solution.
A mediator is a person hired to serve as a neutral party and to facilitate negotiations. While a mediator can be a lawyer, a mediator cannot act as your lawyer after being hired to mediate your case. So, while a mediator who is a lawyer can explain Washington state marriage laws, he or she cannot offer you legal advice or represent your individual legal interests. With collaborative divorce, you have a lawyer who is trained to negotiate, but who also represents you. Your collaborative divorce attorney can provide you with legal advice and is ultimately hired to represent your interests in the matter. Sometimes when couples choose the collaborative divorce process, they might hire a mediator to help them with their negotiations—if, for some reason, negotiations start to break down. But couples who choose collaborative divorce often don’t hire a mediator, and in many cases, won’t need one.
If you want to read more about how collaborative divorce differs from mediation, you can explore the topic in more depth on our blog about Seattle Collaborative Divorce vs. Mediation.
Finally, it’s important to keep in mind that collaborative divorce isn’t right in every situation. If your relationship involved abuse, violence, or coercive control, neither mediation nor collaborative divorce is likely to be appropriate in your situation.
Armed with this information, you can talk to your spouse about having a divorce plan.
A Divorce Plan
Few couples think that they need to have a plan for their divorce, but for every other major life event we tend to have a plan in place. We have estate plans for when we pass away, and we make plans to get married, and yet, so many of us go into divorce without a plan. This can happen for several reasons. Sometimes one spouse files for divorce right after discovering infidelity or after a big argument. Once the divorce process has been initiated, it can feel like a contentious course has been set that cannot be reversed.
As collaborative divorce lawyers, we’re here to let you know that even if one partner has already filed for divorce, you can still choose collaborative divorce. We can help you seek a continuance to change or cancel court dates to give you and your spouse a chance to reach an out-of-court settlement.
If neither of you has filed for divorce, you’re in an even better position.
It can be a good idea to set aside time to create a divorce plan with your spouse. How will you file for divorce? Will one partner file for divorce with their demands and will you go to court if you don’t agree? Or will you choose the collaborative divorce process and aim to file for uncontested divorce?
Even if you and your spouse think you agree about everything and feel ready to file for uncontested divorce today, it can still be wise to have your agreement reviewed by a divorce lawyer. Once you finalize your divorce, you can’t go back and change your settlement. The financial decisions you make in your divorce are final. With so much at stake, it makes sense to have the agreement reviewed by an attorney who has your back.
When couples file for uncontested divorce, the collaborative divorce process can be a great path, because if there are any small issues with the proposed settlement, the collaborative divorce attorneys can work together to help the couple reach an agreement.
If you don’t have a plan for divorce, then your plan will be the default—taking the divorce to court. Or just agreeing to whatever your spouse wants. Either path has its risks—a long, drawn-out, public, and contentious divorce—or financial losses because you left money and property on the table that was rightfully yours because you finalized your divorce without seeking proper legal guidance.
When you’re getting divorced and have children, it’s also important to have a plan, including plans for how you’ll break the news to your children and plans for how you’ll co-parent. The collaborative process can begin before either you or your spouse formally file for divorce, meaning you can start to put co-parenting plans in place with the help of your collaborative divorce lawyers as soon as you are ready—rather than leaving it up to a Temporary Family Law Order or judge to decide.
Choose the Right Place and Time
It’s important to choose the right place and time to have any discussion about divorce. Ideally, you’ll want to pick a place that is private, and a time when you both have ample time to discuss your plan and explore your options.
Choose Your Words Carefully
The words you use when you have these initial divorce discussions can set the foundation and tone for your divorce negotiations in the future. If you come into the conversation blaming your partner or leading with an old argument you’ve had over and over, you aren’t likely to end up anywhere good. Approach the conversation as a learning opportunity. In fact, you can learn quite a bit about how your partner wants to approach this divorce from your conversation about whether he or she is interested in the collaborative process.
It can be helpful to open the conversation with empathy, compassion, and kindness—and common ground. Some good opening statements include:
“I really appreciate what a good parent you are and I want to talk about how we can set ourselves up to be good co-parents after this divorce.”
“I know we have both been struggling with this divorce / the marital challenges we’ve had recently. This is painful for the both of us. I think I see a path forward that might be less painful.”
“The choice to get divorced has been hard on us both, but I think it’s important we talk about the next steps.”
“The marital challenges we have been facing are difficult, and I think it’s important that we find a peaceful path forward.”
Let your spouse know your intentions for the conversation.
“I want us to have an amicable divorce, and I want to talk to you about collaborative divorce as an option.”
“I think it’s important that we have a plan for how we want to approach our divorce. I’ve been doing a little research, and I want to see how you feel about collaborative divorce as our option.”
“Our relationship will be changing, but because we have children, we will always be co-parents. I want us to have a good co-parenting relationship. Could we take a little time to see if collaborative divorce might make sense for our family?”
If feelings arise, it’s okay to share feelings, but try to use “I feel” statements and avoid blame. Until we see that our feelings have been heard, we might be resistant to peace. Unresolved feelings can cause problems later, especially in divorce negotiations. Make space in the conversation to hear your partner’s feelings. Step away if things get heated. And agree on a time and place to circle back.
According to the book, Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most, written by Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, and Sheila Heen, “…difficult conversations at their core are almost never about getting the facts right. They are about conflicting perceptions, interpretations, and values… They are not about what child rearing book is most popular, they are about what child-rearing book we should follow. They are not about what is true, they are about what is important.”
Remind your former partner about what is important, ideally something you both can agree on.
“It’s important that we create a strong co-parenting relationship, and that we find a path forward that’s right for us and right for our kids.”
“I think it’s important to the both of us that we find an amicable path through this divorce.”
“We have some important decisions to make about how to divide assets, property, and debts, and I think we want to do this peacefully, and in a way that is fair for us both. I want to work with you.”
Then, present the facts about collaborative divorce as a potential solution.
Give your partner time to respond and listen to their concerns.
Sometimes it can be helpful for your partner to speak to a collaborative divorce lawyer themselves. The collaborative divorce lawyers in Washington at Truce Law are here to help you and your spouse take the next steps.
This article is for educational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Every situation is unique. For guidance specific to your circumstances, consult a licensed family law attorney in your area.